How Fast Was the Industrial Revolution?

Older textbooks described a sudden 'take-off' in the late 18th century, but economic historians using new statistics have revised this picture. In the 1980s and early 1990s Nicholas Crafts and Knick Harley estimated that British national output grew only about 1 percent a year in the late 18th century and about 2 percent a year in the early 19th century, slower than earlier estimates.

Their work showed that productivity leapt in a few sectors, especially cotton and iron, while much of the economy changed slowly. Critics responded that national averages hide the dramatic transformation of particular regions and that the long-run acceleration was still revolutionary compared with earlier centuries. The debate teaches an important skill: how a historical judgment can depend on the evidence chosen and the scale measured, whether a single industry, a region or a whole nation.